Mary’s song known as the Magnificat says, “God has shown strength with God’s arm; God has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts. God has brought down the powerful from their thrones and lifted up the lowly; God has filled the hungry with good things and sent the rich away empty.” These words describe how God overturns human orderliness.

God overturns human order. Human power more often comes from position and possession of wealth. They are for a limited time. Psalm 15 begins with two questions: Who may abide in your tent? Who may dwell on your holy hill?

And answers, “Those who walk blamelessly, and do what is right, and speak the truth from their heart, who do not lend money at interest, and do not take a bribe against the innocent.”

After the shooting of Alex Pretti in Minneapolis, Bruce Springsteen, a contemporary psalmist in his song titled City of Minneapolis sang,

“A city aflame fought fire and ice
Neath an occupier’s boots
King Trump’s private army from the DHS (department of homeland security)
Guns belted to their coats
Came to Minneapolis to enforce the law
Or so their story goes.

We’ll take our stand for this land
And the stranger in our midst
Here in our home, they killed and roamed
In the winter of ’26
We’ll remember the names of those who died
On the streets of Minneapolis.

However much the power and authority of Trump tries to justify the killing of Alex Pretti and Renee Good, US citizens, by federal agents, the poetry and songs of those who seek justice echo God’s justice.

God’s message to Israel through prophet Micah was, “God has told you, O mortal, what is good; and what does God require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?” The powers and authorities may ignore these words. However, prophets and poets keep God’s message alive. That is because, those who know God, those who speak the truth from their heart, hope in God overturning the human expectations.

Our scripture very clearly lays before us two unshakeable teachings about God overturning the human order.

First, it is in the words of the Beatitudes. Jesus declares to whom belongs the kingdom of God. These indicate how God overturns the human expectations. They point us to where God is, among the lowly. Jesus makes humility a prerequisite for connecting with the divine.

Just as in Springsteen’s song, the lowly need justice and to have their voices heard, so too God waits for human hearts to turn away from evil.

In Christ Jesus’ words: Blessed are the poor, who mourn, meek, hunger and thirst for justice and righteousness, the merciful, pure in heart, peacemakers, and the persecuted. Jesus reveals God will be found in no other way and this way will also be stained by the world’s revulsion, rejections, persecution, slander, and purposes of death. Jesus Christ not only taught the truth but also demonstrated it through his death on the cross.

Secondly, St Paul in his letter to the Corinthians quotes Isaiah 29:14:  The wisdom of the wise shall perish, and their discernment shall be hidden.

“Jews demand signs and Greeks desire wisdom, but we proclaim Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those who are the called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For God’s foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God’s weakness is stronger than human strength.”

God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, things that are not, to reduce to nothing things that are. God overturns.

God overturns human expectations. Cosmic powers and military strength is nothing in God’s powerlessness. God redefines strength as the weakness of the cross. The cross inverts the worldly idea of power and wisdom. The cross, the weakest, the symbol of punishment and suffering is the power and wisdom of God.

God wields power differently. God’s power and strength are used on behalf of the weak and the powerless of the world, the disinherited of society, those we think nothing to offer.

God in whom we trust, thrusts us outward into the world to serve the poor, comfort those who mourn, encourage the meek, and to do justice in the midst of unjust systems.

This God I think even speaks through the words of Springsteen:

Against smoke and rubber bullets
In the dawn’s early light
Citizens stood for justice
Their voices ringing through the night
And there were bloody footprints
Where mercy should have stood
And two dead, left to die on snow-filled streets
Alex Pretti and Renee Good.

God of mercy calls us, not to an imperial military mission, but to go on a mercy mission.

God overturns the human order.